Speakers

Adam Diaz of Lakas Diwa - Keynote Speaker

Yancy Mark Gandionco of BAKLA, LGBTQ coordinator of NAFCON and ANAKBAYAN ny/nj

Jackie Mariano, Filipinas for Rights and Empowerment
Ryan Leano, Sandiwa and League of FIilipino Student
Berna Ellorin of Bayan USA, NYCHRP and NAFCON
Kiwi, Saturday Afternoon Keynote Speaker
Julia V. Camagong, Philippine Forum
Rusty Fabunan, Kapatirang Pilipino
Rico Foz, National Alliance for Filipino Concerns (NAFCON)
Joanna Quiambao, Katarungan
Jane Dizon, Lakas Diwa

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Adam Diaz

Executive DirectorLakas Diwa: Filipino Community Alliance of New Jersey
Labor Representative / Internal Organizer
CNA / NNOC AFL-CIO

Adam D. Diaz, the proud father of eight year old Makarya Diwata, graduated from Rutgers University [NCAS] in May of 1997 suma cum laude, phi beta kappa, with a B.A. in History & Philosophy, and earned the Paul Robeson Award for student leadership. His campus based organizing efforts ultimately secured an Asian Studies program at Rutgers-Newark, ironically after which, administration banned him from the Paul Robeson Campus Center for a time. Adam went on to complete coursework for an M.A. in Southeast Asian Studies at Cornell University, focusing on United States Imperialism in the Philippines, and Filipino American Communities, before spending time in Southern California, where he organized the economically dislocated around issues of health care reform. He returned to the Northeast in 2001 to spearhead a gang alternative program for students at Canarsie High School, in Brooklyn, before assuming the position of Organizer, with New Jersey's largest health care union, HPAE, where he organized nurses in Jersey City, NJ around issues of improved patient care. Adam is currently bi-coastal, splitting time between Southern California where he has made a home for his daughter, and Northern New Jersey, where he continues his work in the Filipino community. He serves as Labor Representative for the nation's largest and most progressive RN union, the California Nurses Association / National Nurses Organizing Committee, and is responsible for collective bargaining activities in the southern portion of California's Central Valley region; the CNA / NNOC has recently initiated a campaign for universal healthcare in the United States, the only industrialized nation yet to have a nationalized system for all. Most significantly, Adam serves as the founding Executive Director of Lakas Diwa, a progressive, direct action oriented 501(c)(3) not for profit organization based in Northern New Jersey, which works with Filipino youth around issues of community advocacy and cultural literacy, and was recently appointment Labor Sector Chair of the National Alliance of Filipino Concerns (NAFCON).

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Yancy Mark Gandionco

Yancy Mark Gandionco of BAKLA, LGBTQ coordinator of NAFCON and ANAKBAYAN ny/nj.
BAKLA or Bagong Asosasyon ng Kabaklaan para sa Liberasyon sa Amerika (New Association of Gays for Liberation in America), the recently established gay focus group centered in New York, is where Mark Yancy Gandionco currently serves as the co-founder and Chairperson. He also currently serves as the LGBTQ Coordinator for the National Alliance for Filipino Concerns (NAFCON), where he nationally organizes educational discussions to raise awareness about issues Filipino American LGBTQ face in the United States. He is also the present Vice-President of Anakbayan New York/New Jersey, a Filipino Youth Collective. While editor of his high school paper, his article on discrimination of homosexuals was censored this propelled him into the world community action. When attending University of San Carlos, he was elected Chairperson of the College Editors Guild of the Philippines where he published various articles and statements concerning different topics with focus on LGBTQ issues in the Philippines. He also closely worked with PRO-GAY Cebu. In 2004, he finished his education in Nursing at Oklahoma State University. Yancy moved to New York City in 2005 where he is smitten by the sound of overhead trains in Queens, juicy buns and red bean ice cream in Chinatown, and making snow angels in the heart of Filipino Town - Woodside, NY. And if he was a 'Heroes' character, he would be the Cheerleader. Save the Cheerleader, Save the world.

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Jackie Mariano

Filipinas Rights and Empowerment
Jackie Mariano of FIND D3 Miss Philippines ’08, FIRE and Gabriela USA Filipinas for Rights and Empowerment (FiRE) is a mass based women’s organization serving New York City and its surrounding areas. We are dedicated to global and local Filipina and Filipina American issues. We believe that class oppression is inextricable to the struggle of women; therefore we support and create women’s initiatives by fostering leadership, building alliances and mobilizing our immigrant and native-born community through critical education and learning. We are an anti-imperialist formation working in solidarity with the National Democratic movement of the Philippines. We connect the Filipino diaspora to the women’s struggle in the Philippines by organizing across class, gender, sexual identity, and age lines. Bringing woman-born and woman-identified people together, we challenge pervading stereotypes by creating self-defined Filipina identities. Jackie Mariano is an incoming second-year undergraduate student at Hunter College of the City University of New York. In her first year of college, she joined the Pilipinos of Hunter (POH), to further explore her identity. During her time with POH, Jackie attented an educational discussion held by members of Anakbayan NY/NJ and Filipinas for Rights and Empowerment (FiRE NYC). Her interest in Philippine history and politics was peaked at the workshop and, from then on, Jackie immersed herself in community organizing, particularly towards women's rights issues at the local level and those in the Philippines with FiRE NYC.

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Ryan Leano

Sandiwa and League of FIlipino Students
iii. Ryan Leano of P.S.P batch ’06, Sandiwa and LFS. "The artist is a committed person who will always take the side of any human being who is violated, abused, oppressed, dehumanized, through whatever instrument--the pen, the brush, or the camera." -Lino Brocka, "Artist as Citizen" As a cultural worker, these are the words that Ryan Leano lives by, as an dancer, writer, and educator. His life as an artist began when he started dancing Hiphop and Filipino cultural dances since high school. His social consciousness was always in him, but wasn't harnessed until majoring in Asian American Studies in college. This two major parts of his life are the reasons he decided to get his masters' at SFSU, by combining the importance of art and social consciousness. During his grad studies, and to this day, he lives and breathes art and activism through the various organizations he works with, including Pin@y Educational Partnerships (PEP), Kulintang Arts, Active Leadership to Advance the Youth (ALAY), SanDiwa, League of Filipino Students, and more recently, Committee for Human Rights in the Philippines. Currently, he's just balancing being a college lecturer, an activist, an artist, and having a collective life, all in his own way of serving the people.

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Berna Ellorin

Bayan USA, NYCHRP and NAFCON
Bernadette Ellorin is the current Secretary-General of BAYAN-USA, the first overseas territorial chapter of BAYAN Philippines. She is also the Special Commissioner for Philippine based-Concerns of the National Alliance for Filipino Concerns or NAFCON. In her capacity, she develops national campaigns and press machineries for over 12 Filipino people's organizations in the United States and liaisons with social justice organizations in the Philippines. She is also part of the Secretariat of the Justice for the Sentosa 27 campaign against illegal recruitment. In the late 1990's into the early 2000's, Ellorin served as a member of Philippine Forum's youth arm, formerly named MAKABAYAN. She also helped to establish a young Filipino women's organization named FORWARD in New York City from 2001 to 2003. Bernadette is originally from San Diego, California and is now living in Brooklyn, NY with her husband. Bernadette is honored to be a part of the Sandiwa National Fil-Am Youth Conference because so much potential for social and economic change comes from the Filipino youth. Welcome!

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Kiwi

(Hip-Hop Artist)
Kiwi is a Los Angeles native now residing in San Francisco. He has been an integral part of the bay area’s independent hip hop scene for years, having begun rapping in the late 1980s. His first full-length album, Writes of Passage: Portraits of a Son Rising, was released in 2003. He has also appeared on ELEMNOP's From the Ground Up Mixtape, the Movementality 2 (Disc 2) End's The High End Sound, the Native Guns Stray Bullets Mixtape Vol. 1, and Bambu's Self Untitled. Kiwi also used to produce and host Apex Express (Asian Pacific Islander Community Radio), a radio program on Berkely California's 94.1 FM

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JULIA V. CAMAGONG

Philippine Forum
Julia V. Camagong is the Co-Executive Director of Philippine Forum. She is a 2003 recipient of the Union Square Awards which honors individuals who make notable contributions to the educational, economic, and cultural life in New York. Julia has recently been elected as Vice President for Programs of the National Alliance for Filipino Concerns (NAFCON). She is the Program Director of the Philippine Studies Program, which brings Filipino American youth to the Philippines for a live-and-study program in coordination with the University of the Philippines and the University of California System. In the Philippines, she performed in street plays during the anti-Marcos rallies in the Philippines, as part of the theater group Peryante (Carnival Players), was co-founder and Executive Director of the San Francisco based theater group Teatro ng Tanan (Theater for Everyone), and has produced, directed and acted in plays, films, and television. Julia has been a consultant for FIND since 1997.

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Rusty Fabunan

Kapatirang Pilipino
Rusty Fabunan has been deeply involved in Filipino-American organizing ever since college. He was on the FIND National Steering Committee from 1993 to 1998 and a member of the District III Executive Board. Rusty Fabunan was the founder for the Filipino Cultural Society at Queens borough Community College as well as serving as Executive Vice President for the Queens borough Student Government; His honors include the Presidential Awardee in1995, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Scholarship Award in1996, Whose who among American Colleges in1996, United States Student Association as a 1997 Congress Delegate, and from 1999 to 2002, he was a New York City Teaching Fellow/Phi Beta Kappa. Mr. Fabunan also served as a Board of Director for the New York Public Interest Research Group in 1997. Also in that year, he co-founded the Philippine Forum and has been the Program Director since 2004. He has been a New York City Public School Teacher since 2002. He has also been pivotal in organizing and accompanying the participants of the Philippine Studies Program. He recently co-founded the only Filipino fraternity, named Kapatirang Pilipino or Kappa Pi, whose sole purpose is to serve, and only serve the broader Filipino community locally, nationally and globally. He is a brother, poet, and student of the people!

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Rico Foz

National Alliance for Filipino Concerns (NAFCON)
Romerico Foz or "Rico" is the Executive Vice President of the National Alliance for Filipino Concerns (NAFCON), a national multi-issue alliance of Filipino organizations and individuals in the United States serving to protect the rights and welfare of Filipinos by fighting for social, economic, and racial justice and equality. It was launched in San Jose California in 2003. At present, NAFCON members encompass over 23 cities in the United States. He is also a member of the organizing committee for the Philippine Forum New Jersey branch and the Justice for Immigrants Filipino Coalition (J4I). In the Philippines, Rico became part of the Economic Planning Commission of the Bagong Alyansang Makabayan, responsible for drafting legislative proposals to advance the nationalist industrialization program and building alliances like the Coalition Against Oil Price Increase (CAOPI), Stop VAT Coalition, and the Freedom from Debt Coalition. Rico also served as the National Spokesperson of the League of Filipino Students from (1986-87). Professionally, from 1999, Rico worked his way up in the academe, from a business school instructor to a school vice-president in 2005. He also owns Fozworth International, a real estate and consultancy company. However, in 2006, he decided to go back to a life he enjoys the most • community organizing. Today, he is a community health worker from New York University's Project AsPIRE (Asian-American Partnerships in Research & Empowerment), a community-based participatory research with an aim to reduce hypertension and cardio-vascular diseases among Filipinos in Jersey City. Recently, he received an advocacy award from Phil-US expo. He was also an advocate and spearheading the campaign for justice for the 27+ Sentosa Nurses against illegal recruitment.

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Joanna Quiambao

Katarungan
Joanna Quiambao is a Senior at Virginia Commonwealth University, Majoring in International Social Justice Studies/Minor in Sociology. She was a participant in the Philippine Studies Program in 2004-05. She is also the Coordinator for SanDiwa South East. She has also been working at the Office of Multicultural Student Affairs as a Program Assistant since 2003. She also organizes the VCU School of World Studies Student Advisory Board Committee, Asian Student Caucus Officer, and Vice President of the Council for American/International Student Affairs @ VCU 2007. Currently, she is an active member of Katarungan and GMA watch based in Virginia and Washington DC. Her future Occupation: Working for THE PEOPLE!

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Jane Razon

Lakas Diwa
LAKAS DIWA actively devotes itself to the service and empowerment of youth of Filipino descent, in and around the Jersey City, New Jersey region in tangible and practical ways, utilizing methods deeply rooted in the principles of 'direct action' organizing. Lakas Diwa's mission, positive alternatives and a safe haven for youth of Filipino descent, through a progressive curriculum, artistic, cultural, educational, and recreational in nature; Its philosophy, to provide youth of Filipino descent with ready access to leadership positions within the organization, and full inclusion in all community organizing initiative, as a way to foster the development of young minds and voices, as well as a true sense of community ownership; The culmination of community vision, effort, and sacrifice, the Lakas Diwa collective draws from several progressive Filipino community organizations and initiatives, and is composed of high school and college age students, as well as young professionals.

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